Samsung Electronics officially announced aggressive M&A. The Korean consumer electronics giant also presented a vision of becoming a global leader in home appliances, medical devices, smart pads as well as TVs and smartphones. The company is planning to further reinforce its market dominance as an innovative company by disclosing the ‘foldable’ display in 2015.

Samsung Electronics presented the mid-to long-term strategy and vision, including the aforementioned, on the ‘2nd Analyst Day’ held on November 6 in Hotel Shilla, Jangchung-dong, Seoul.

To become a market leader, Samsung Electronics will go full speed ahead with open innovation like M&A. “We have been conservative and passive when it comes to adopting outside technology,” said Kwon Oh-hyeon, vice-chairman and CEO, Samsung Electronics. “We will be more aggressive in M&A from now on.” Lee Sang-hoon, CFO, also said in an answer to a question about the large amount of cash that SEC has “We will use the money on M&A. Things will be different as for using cash.”

The company will enter a bidding battle for a US company. It will fight a bloody battle with global leading enterprises like Google and Apple. Samsung will take advantage of the Open Innovation Center it opened this year in Silicon Valley and New York, US. The center will spearhead not only the fostering of startups possessed of ideas and technologies, but also the acquisition of other companies.

“The Open Innovation Center will play an important role in M&A,” said Mr. Kwon Oh-hyeon. “It will enhance the technology of Samsung and provide our customers with higher values.”

SEC will turn the TV and household appliances sector, which are deemed to have reached maturity, into growth engines. “Home appliance products can use more innovation. They are no different than 30-40 years ago,” explained Mr. Kwon Oh-hyeon. “This means that we can apply digital technology to home appliance products, and add more value to them.” “Both TVs and household appliances have a great deal of growth potential,” said Yoon Boo-geun, president of the consumer electronics (CE) division of Samsung Electronics. “We will continue our innovation and become a leader of the industry.”

Mr. Kwon said that the company would lead innovation by introducing the ‘foldable’ display in 2015. The foldable display is so difficult to make that it is the last stage of the flexible display. It is expected that this technology will take more than 10 years to develop, and production of foldable displays means that the foldable smart device has been developed.

Samsung also presented its goals, i.e. consolidating its No. 1 position in the smartphone market, and becoming No, 1 in the smart pad market as well. Starting with the Galaxy Gear, SEC will continue to create new growth engines like wearable devices. “The tablet business started to grow rapidly from the second half of last year, and this year the sales volume will exceed 40 million units,” said Shin Jong-gyun, president of the IT and module (IM) division. “In the first half of this year, Samsung accounted for about 20% of the tablet market, and now we want to challenge ourselves to become the market leader.”

Filip Weintraub Labrusca, portfolio manager, said “We present our vision at this event. It will have a positive influence on the market.” This is the second such event since SEC held the first Analyst Day 8 years ago in 2005. Domestic and overseas investors and 400 or so analysts attended this event.